As I drove into Kinvara last weekend I was saddened to see that Winkles pub (more recently called the Crane) has finally been demolished. It has been on the cards for ages now, with planning for redevelopment moving swiftly to its conclusion, and having finally closed its doors last New Year’s Eve after a great night with music supplied by Paul Bradley and Co. However, as long as it was still standing, I still held out some sort of hope that the place would survive and reopen.
Although I’ve only known the place in more recent times, Winkles had been a great place for music of the years, and had become very well known as a great session pub. Sharon Shannon’s first album was recorded there, as was “Live at Winkles” by the Lahawns. It was also owned by Frankie Gavin for a time. I'm sure many members here will have played there over the years, and will be as saddened as I am at the loss.
The reason for its demolition? To make way for a new supermarket and housing development. Somehow I feel it is a sign of what is happening across Ireland and beyond...
Well, that's what's needed for all those bungalows that have been thrown-up there...
The Irish Music Theme Park is in the plans too, but, as I was told, they aren't hiring until 2010, so work up a good strong stage Irish accent for the tourists, most of who will be coming from Cork, Dublin, Belfast and that city down the road from there ~ Galway... I don't think they've settled on a name for it yet though, but I suspect they'll find something quaint in school-Irish, with a Connemara twist. I suspect they'll have to import marble from Italy or Eastern Europe and die it green for the little Chinese made plastic Leprechauns to perch on...
Do you have your Kelly green knee britches and braces yet?
''Somehow I feel it is a sign of what is happening across Ireland and beyond...''
Yes, only too typical of modern Ireland, where good pubs seem to be disappearing at a terrifying rate....
In Ballydehob, where I live, Gabe's bar, once a great session bar, is now, sadly , a hairdressers.
I'm getting this image of a salon full of people, heads stuck under those big hair driers, playing away at 'Comb Your Hair and Curl It'...
Sad though, any good venue closing.
There's no allowed hairdressing allowed in Irish music!
No hairdressing!
Sad to here about winkles all the same.
Did the cuckoo fleadh there with Mick McAuley(Kilkenny and Dublin crews) and co. about 12 and 13 yrs ago..
Stayed upstairs,knutz,twas a kip to sleep in but was perfect for our ball game.
I can remember the sessions were so fast the 2nd yr we were all accused of taking speed,seriously we couldn't get anything,we just had a speedy up guitarist.....
RIP Winkles Bar, and all those venues and great landlords and ladies that are no more... While I hope that rest for the past, may there be more to open their doors and hearts to the music and dance and give it a home... The optimist in me remains hopeful, but I know that nothing happens without effort and guidance. So, if things are slim in your neck of the woods, beat the bushes and get together the like minded and try to make it happen. Make a place for yourself, and if that changes or ends, don't give up, keep the homefires burning, the passion, keep playing and keep that 'welcome at the door'... If nothing else, my favourite music, of which I had a good day's worth of it today, is in the house rather than in a pub, but I value both if not equally...
Ceolachan, can you please point us in the direction of a link which actually affirms that there's going to be an Irish Theme Park in Kinvara? I've searched long and hard and can't find anything.
Starting with the B's? - bananas for a start- and plenty of them (to cure any stage fright). Not sure about the singing and jigging bit, though. Maybe a little discrete foot-tapping as we play.
Do you remember the old PG Tips ad before the acting dried up?- digging the Channel Tunnel, and the immortal line- "This isn't bleedin' Calais, this is bleedin' Catford" - (came up in Danny's back garden, actually). Oh, the fun we had
"Redevelopment"...sounds eerily similar to "reeducation". Why can't people there learn from our mistakes here in the U.S. in the days of "Urban Renewal" when hundreds of beautiful old buildings were torn down to make room for shopping centers and developments. Buildings that were ugly then and even worse now.
The builders are in just now, doing the kitchen. A few weeks ago when digging the foundations in the back garden they found a well...or something....so it must have been those chimps trying to dig to Calais after all, way back in the 60's.........
When we were living up top of a particularly beautiful valley, over in the Southwest, old stone cottages were being bulldozed and loads of ugly breeze block bungalows were going up ~ in the name of progress. (& it wouldn't surprise me to find some of the builders were from the Eastern side of the Euro Block) I remember returning to Kerry and driving along the coast and from a distance the stretch of white breeze block bungalows looked like seagull shight... Those seagulls must be getting awful big and awful plentiful, because I keep seeing more and more of those massive piles of seagull shight.
Thanks KML...you made me realy mad with the Hills of Tara link!
I find it very sad...it's amazing the things we've lost here, so sad to see it happen elsewhere. Especially when people in Ireland are being more aware and proactive than people were here during our worst period.
I had an interesting conversation with a husband and wife who own a pub near me. I can't remember where they're from (I want to say Louth) but they were saying (and I've heard this from other Irish who are here in the U.S.) that there was a very massive public opposition to a lot of things that are happening in Ireland, but that it is too easy for the will of the people to be ignored, overruled, covered up etc.
I've heard recent rish emigrants to North America refer to themselves as "fleeing the Celtic Tiger". I'm sure that sentiment isn't universal, and it's odd that they'd come here of all places, but it certainly isn't your average man on the street behind all of this. Sermon concluded...
Bodhran bliss', "wonderful capitalism" remark reminded me of the film Local Hero (and Mark Knopfler's soundtrack) which seems to be being played out for real.
Seems to me, capitalism is promoted by rich powerful people who want to get even more rich and powerful,which is a kind of pathology,IMO.Couldn't someone ask Trump how many grains of sand in a handful?
Seems to me,if anybody wants a future for children and grand children,we all have to completely change our values and how we see the world and how we treat one another and the Earth.
And we have such very little time to bring such a huge change about.
"Celtic Tiger" = a growth in the corruption that was present in government and elsewhere...
And something akin to the Bush family, the Royal family of that other government the other side of the Atlantic bog, who own a good stretch of New England coast... Certain powerful people in Ireland have done similar, for their own personal possession, or to develop with low cost and high profit in mind for the growing summer home industry. Now, let's see, who was it that bought the Blaskets?
Also growing along the West Coast, and I suspect elsewhere too, is the problem of pollution and sewage treatment, which escalates as all the crappers get more use during the holidays. It is inherent in 'islands' that they are overpopulated, too many bodies per square kilometer for the health of other life forms, or the sanity of that population. Demand ~ supply ~ corruption ~ profit ~ lack of consideration for any environment, including community dynamics and the cultural...
But hey, we could always live 'virtually'? Then, possibly, all any one of us would need would be a space the size of a closet? ~ and we could stack these or build huge floating colonies of them...
I think we're already there, Ceol- living virtually, that is. You meet a better class of person here (give or take a few)- and from yours and others' descriptions, it sure beats trying to realise the illusory dream of return.
The old mustard board is our haven, our sanity, our university of Irish music- I'll settle for that rather than a seagull-sh*t bungalow in a ghetto anyday.
BTW, you can take off the pinny now...we're free
I don't know,who bought the Blaskets? Missed that.If the only thing about the Bush dynasty was owning New England coast it wouldn't be so bad http://www.tarpley.net/bushb.htm
I don't think there's much chance of eradicating greed and corruption,if the historical record is anything to go by.And that's not always the problem.I live in a beautiful unspoiled place.I was talking to an old guy who has tremendous power and influence in the locality.He's one of the guys who decides what happens when planning applications are made.He said what's needed is some factories and industry to provide jobs and more houses to build up the population.It's not that this guy is greedy or evil in himself.He sees himself as dedicated to helping local people.The problem is that his whole mindset is out of date.When he was growing up the problem was how to improve housing conditions and health and transport links and all that stuff.It's impossible for him to get his head around the new situation we have facing us.Economic growth and raised standards of living are completely irrelevant if the result is that the global ecology collapses and the planet becomes uninhabitable.The scientists are tearing their hair out with frustration because their warnings don't seem to get through to the politicians,who only care about the next election,and to business,which only cares about the quarterly results....every little town and city on the planet has it's equivalent 'big guy',who wants to see local prosperity and growth,and who will win popularity by promising wealth and security.It's a pipe dream.
We'd need three Earths just to carry on as we are.Something has to change...
Was there a time when dancers with their fiddles
In childrens circuses could stay their troubles?
There was a time they could cry over books,
But time has set its maggots on their track.
Under the arc of the sky they are unsafe.
What's never known is safest in this life.
Under the skysigns they who have no arms
Have cleanest hands, and, as the heartless ghost
Alone's unhurt, so the blind man sees best.
Big Yellow Taxi ~ Joanie Mitchell
They paved paradise and put up a parking lot,
with a pink hotel, a boutique and a swinging hot spot.
Don't it always seem to go,
That you don't know what you've got till it's gone.
They've paved paradise and put up a parking lot...
They took all the trees and put them in a tree museum
and they charged the people a dollar and a half just to see them.
Don't it always seem to go,
That you don't know what you've got till it's gone.
They've paved paradise and put up a parking lot... ~
RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
As I drove into Kinvara last weekend I was saddened to see that Winkles pub (more recently called the Crane) has finally been demolished. It has been on the cards for ages now, with planning for redevelopment moving swiftly to its conclusion, and having finally closed its doors last New Year’s Eve after a great night with music supplied by Paul Bradley and Co. However, as long as it was still standing, I still held out some sort of hope that the place would survive and reopen.
Although I’ve only known the place in more recent times, Winkles had been a great place for music of the years, and had become very well known as a great session pub. Sharon Shannon’s first album was recorded there, as was “Live at Winkles” by the Lahawns. It was also owned by Frankie Gavin for a time. I'm sure many members here will have played there over the years, and will be as saddened as I am at the loss.
The reason for its demolition? To make way for a new supermarket and housing development. Somehow I feel it is a sign of what is happening across Ireland and beyond...
# Posted on December 4th 2007 by Mike C
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
Well, that's what's needed for all those bungalows that have been thrown-up there...
The Irish Music Theme Park is in the plans too, but, as I was told, they aren't hiring until 2010, so work up a good strong stage Irish accent for the tourists, most of who will be coming from Cork, Dublin, Belfast and that city down the road from there ~ Galway... I don't think they've settled on a name for it yet though, but I suspect they'll find something quaint in school-Irish, with a Connemara twist. I suspect they'll have to import marble from Italy or Eastern Europe and die it green for the little Chinese made plastic Leprechauns to perch on...
Do you have your Kelly green knee britches and braces yet?
# Posted on December 4th 2007 by ceolachan
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
''Somehow I feel it is a sign of what is happening across Ireland and beyond...''
Yes, only too typical of modern Ireland, where good pubs seem to be disappearing at a terrifying rate....
In Ballydehob, where I live, Gabe's bar, once a great session bar, is now, sadly , a hairdressers.
# Posted on December 4th 2007 by cathycook
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
Well, at least these places aren't as smoke filled as they used to be.
# Posted on December 4th 2007 by feardearg
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
What's wrong with mixing hairdressing with Irish music?
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by ceolachan
That could be a new wave, Irish themed hairdressing!
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by ceolachan
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
I'll have a slipjig cut please
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by Donough
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
I'm getting this image of a salon full of people, heads stuck under those big hair driers, playing away at 'Comb Your Hair and Curl It'...
Sad though, any good venue closing.
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by P-K
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
There's no allowed hairdressing allowed in Irish music!
No hairdressing!
Sad to here about winkles all the same.
Did the cuckoo fleadh there with Mick McAuley(Kilkenny and Dublin crews) and co. about 12 and 13 yrs ago..
Stayed upstairs,knutz,twas a kip to sleep in but was perfect for our ball game.
I can remember the sessions were so fast the 2nd yr we were all accused of taking speed,seriously we couldn't get anything,we just had a speedy up guitarist.....
riskay,
P
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by P.browne
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
Peter, you canNOT be serious-
whaddya mean, no hairdressing?
Paddy Keenan, Alex Finn, Frankie Gavin???
I rest my case.
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by P-K
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
'whaddya mean, no hairdressing?'
I suppose the only answer there would have been 'Mick Coyne'
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by <>-_-_-<>
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
Dublin/Cockney slang....
Although I haven't had mine done in you don't want to know...
I can understand the perm boys,but KEENAN?
Doesn't he always have a hat on?
Well,there is that BBC wet mop footage...
P
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by P.browne
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
How's Mick doing?
He popped into my gig in Disney,waved at me and slagged me from distance about making $,giggled and left,about six months ago.
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by P.browne
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
RIP Winkles Bar, and all those venues and great landlords and ladies that are no more... While I hope that rest for the past, may there be more to open their doors and hearts to the music and dance and give it a home... The optimist in me remains hopeful, but I know that nothing happens without effort and guidance. So, if things are slim in your neck of the woods, beat the bushes and get together the like minded and try to make it happen. Make a place for yourself, and if that changes or ends, don't give up, keep the homefires burning, the passion, keep playing and keep that 'welcome at the door'... If nothing else, my favourite music, of which I had a good day's worth of it today, is in the house rather than in a pub, but I value both if not equally...
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by ceolachan
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
Ceolachan, can you please point us in the direction of a link which actually affirms that there's going to be an Irish Theme Park in Kinvara? I've searched long and hard and can't find anything.
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by Floss the Tethers
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
Speaking of rebranding, new lamps for old an' all, here's a nice bit of whimsy lifted from an architectural forum discussing the 'Spire' in Dublin:-
"Maybe they could rename the whole street by replacing the 'C' in O Connell with a 'D' and turn it into an Irish music theme park?"
Great idea, though no self-respecting chimp would play *there*, obviously.
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by P-K
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
Starting with the B's? - bananas for a start- and plenty of them (to cure any stage fright). Not sure about the singing and jigging bit, though. Maybe a little discrete foot-tapping as we play.
Do you remember the old PG Tips ad before the acting dried up?- digging the Channel Tunnel, and the immortal line- "This isn't bleedin' Calais, this is bleedin' Catford" - (came up in Danny's back garden, actually). Oh, the fun we had
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by P-K
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
"Redevelopment"...sounds eerily similar to "reeducation". Why can't people there learn from our mistakes here in the U.S. in the days of "Urban Renewal" when hundreds of beautiful old buildings were torn down to make room for shopping centers and developments. Buildings that were ugly then and even worse now.
Some mistakes can't be corrected...
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by meemtp
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
The builders are in just now, doing the kitchen. A few weeks ago when digging the foundations in the back garden they found a well...or something....so it must have been those chimps trying to dig to Calais after all, way back in the 60's.........
meemtp - the reason is simple: money and lack of proper building control. And Ireland doesn't have a proud record on this one.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wood_Quay
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hill_of_Tara
Not that the UK is much better I hasten to add.
# Posted on December 5th 2007 by Nick Splease
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
When we were living up top of a particularly beautiful valley, over in the Southwest, old stone cottages were being bulldozed and loads of ugly breeze block bungalows were going up ~ in the name of progress. (& it wouldn't surprise me to find some of the builders were from the Eastern side of the Euro Block) I remember returning to Kerry and driving along the coast and from a distance the stretch of white breeze block bungalows looked like seagull shight... Those seagulls must be getting awful big and awful plentiful, because I keep seeing more and more of those massive piles of seagull shight.
# Posted on December 6th 2007 by ceolachan
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
Thanks KML...you made me realy mad with the Hills of Tara link!
I find it very sad...it's amazing the things we've lost here, so sad to see it happen elsewhere. Especially when people in Ireland are being more aware and proactive than people were here during our worst period.
I had an interesting conversation with a husband and wife who own a pub near me. I can't remember where they're from (I want to say Louth) but they were saying (and I've heard this from other Irish who are here in the U.S.) that there was a very massive public opposition to a lot of things that are happening in Ireland, but that it is too easy for the will of the people to be ignored, overruled, covered up etc.
I've heard recent rish emigrants to North America refer to themselves as "fleeing the Celtic Tiger". I'm sure that sentiment isn't universal, and it's odd that they'd come here of all places, but it certainly isn't your average man on the street behind all of this. Sermon concluded...
# Posted on December 6th 2007 by meemtp
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
Bodhran bliss', "wonderful capitalism" remark reminded me of the film Local Hero (and Mark Knopfler's soundtrack) which seems to be being played out for real.
http://news.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=1425&id=1902482007
Seems to me, capitalism is promoted by rich powerful people who want to get even more rich and powerful,which is a kind of pathology,IMO.Couldn't someone ask Trump how many grains of sand in a handful?
Seems to me,if anybody wants a future for children and grand children,we all have to completely change our values and how we see the world and how we treat one another and the Earth.
And we have such very little time to bring such a huge change about.
http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2007/12/04/what-is-progress/
# Posted on December 6th 2007 by wolfbird
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
"Celtic Tiger" = a growth in the corruption that was present in government and elsewhere...
And something akin to the Bush family, the Royal family of that other government the other side of the Atlantic bog, who own a good stretch of New England coast... Certain powerful people in Ireland have done similar, for their own personal possession, or to develop with low cost and high profit in mind for the growing summer home industry. Now, let's see, who was it that bought the Blaskets?
Also growing along the West Coast, and I suspect elsewhere too, is the problem of pollution and sewage treatment, which escalates as all the crappers get more use during the holidays. It is inherent in 'islands' that they are overpopulated, too many bodies per square kilometer for the health of other life forms, or the sanity of that population. Demand ~ supply ~ corruption ~ profit ~ lack of consideration for any environment, including community dynamics and the cultural...
But hey, we could always live 'virtually'? Then, possibly, all any one of us would need would be a space the size of a closet? ~ and we could stack these or build huge floating colonies of them...
# Posted on December 6th 2007 by ceolachan
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
I think we're already there, Ceol- living virtually, that is. You meet a better class of person here (give or take a few)- and from yours and others' descriptions, it sure beats trying to realise the illusory dream of return.
The old mustard board is our haven, our sanity, our university of Irish music- I'll settle for that rather than a seagull-sh*t bungalow in a ghetto anyday.
BTW, you can take off the pinny now...we're free
# Posted on December 6th 2007 by P-K
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
I don't know,who bought the Blaskets? Missed that.If the only thing about the Bush dynasty was owning New England coast it wouldn't be so bad
http://www.tarpley.net/bushb.htm
I don't think there's much chance of eradicating greed and corruption,if the historical record is anything to go by.And that's not always the problem.I live in a beautiful unspoiled place.I was talking to an old guy who has tremendous power and influence in the locality.He's one of the guys who decides what happens when planning applications are made.He said what's needed is some factories and industry to provide jobs and more houses to build up the population.It's not that this guy is greedy or evil in himself.He sees himself as dedicated to helping local people.The problem is that his whole mindset is out of date.When he was growing up the problem was how to improve housing conditions and health and transport links and all that stuff.It's impossible for him to get his head around the new situation we have facing us.Economic growth and raised standards of living are completely irrelevant if the result is that the global ecology collapses and the planet becomes uninhabitable.The scientists are tearing their hair out with frustration because their warnings don't seem to get through to the politicians,who only care about the next election,and to business,which only cares about the quarterly results....every little town and city on the planet has it's equivalent 'big guy',who wants to see local prosperity and growth,and who will win popularity by promising wealth and security.It's a pipe dream.
We'd need three Earths just to carry on as we are.Something has to change...
# Posted on December 6th 2007 by wolfbird
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
Only 3? ~
# Posted on December 6th 2007 by ceolachan
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
Was there a time ~ Dylan Thomas
Was there a time when dancers with their fiddles
In childrens circuses could stay their troubles?
There was a time they could cry over books,
But time has set its maggots on their track.
Under the arc of the sky they are unsafe.
What's never known is safest in this life.
Under the skysigns they who have no arms
Have cleanest hands, and, as the heartless ghost
Alone's unhurt, so the blind man sees best.
Big Yellow Taxi ~ Joanie Mitchell
They paved paradise and put up a parking lot,
with a pink hotel, a boutique and a swinging hot spot.
Don't it always seem to go,
That you don't know what you've got till it's gone.
They've paved paradise and put up a parking lot...
They took all the trees and put them in a tree museum
and they charged the people a dollar and a half just to see them.
Don't it always seem to go,
That you don't know what you've got till it's gone.
They've paved paradise and put up a parking lot... ~
# Posted on December 6th 2007 by ceolachan
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
I liked Bob Dylan's croaky version "Big yellow bulldozer took away my house and my land"
Visionaries,both of them.But did anyone pay any heed?
# Posted on December 6th 2007 by wolfbird
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
Abrakadabra
# Posted on December 6th 2007 by P.browne
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
P.browne, welcome back. You noticed! It is amazing what a little house cleaning can do. Now I can hang up my penny... Free at last, free at last...
I listen wolfbird, a constant habit, and I have seen worse...
# Posted on December 7th 2007 by ceolachan
Re: RIP - Winkles Bar, Kinvara, Co. Galway
Amen to that.
# Posted on December 8th 2007 by P-K